Sunday, January 20, 2008
singapore's sorry state
i learnt in class some days ago that singapore has removed 95-99% of our natural forests (including mangroves) and is one of the world's top deforestors. with a percentage that high, it's no wonder really. on top of being ungracious people, we can add to our accolades "really un-green people". and then the ministry of education removes ecology and conservation from the secondary school biology curriculum. now, school-going children aren't even learning about just how much we're damaging the earth. gosh!i'm not even all that green myself, i'm guilty of having a hard copy of my notes, and having stashes of paper all over the place. at least i make the effort though. i use half the amount of paper i could potentially be using by printing on both sides. the reason i have paper stashed all over is so i have a constant supply of rough paper, only throwing away what i can't find space to write on.
so, back to taking biology out of the syllabus. i get that not everything can be covered within two years, and what is covered gives you a pretty good idea of the priorities of the government. until conservation groups become pte ltd's, i'm pretty sure they'll never be as important as that next cloning (unethical!!!) lab. we're a society driven entirely by economics. though conservation might not always make the most economical sense, it is important because pretty soon, we'll all fry from the gamma rays from the sun (or get killed when Sirius blows up!). extinction is at a record high. as far as it is a natural phenomenon, it is taking place at unnatural rates. also, according to Noam Chomsky, given the natural lifespan of entire species is about 100,000 years, humans are at the tail end of that timeframe. we're killing ourselves.
if one should ask you what's wrong with the earth, the answer should be pretty obvious... HUMANS. (then capitalism, but that's another post..)
Posted by selina at 8:49 pm
2 Comments:
do we still have the whole be green thing in ME though?
And speaking of things being taken out of the syllabus, DISSECTIONS. I'm 21, and on Tuesday, I'll be doing my FIRST EVER whole organism dissection.
By 
adrienne, at
January 21, 2008 8:00 am
well, i've never done a whole organism dissection before. i've only seen it being done to a big fish. though, logically, as an educator it's good we don't have dissections. i don't want some silly goose slicing off a finger or something. i'd have to write a whole report! i wonder how strict the rules are though..if i can perform the dissection while they watch. though i'm hell-bent on teaching GP at SA...no bio for me.
By selina, at
January 22, 2008 12:12 am
